Sunday, January 31, 2010

We've been seriously missing pizza around here, so I decided to try my hand at one. I was inspired by THIS post on the Chow Vegan blog, and it reminded me of our old omnivorous favorite from Papa John's back in the United States. That pizza had ridiculous amounts of cheese and bacon on it, and we would order one about twice per month. We ate a LOT of it. This one is vegan, so it won't exactly be the same deal, but - you know - I always felt guilty after eating that pizza. I don't think I'll feel any remorse at all for eating this one.

I bought some bok choy last week with the intention of making it my Vegetable of the Week, but it didn't work out very well because I had a visitor, we ended up eating out a lot...etcetera. So the outer leaves were beginning to look a bit wilted. I needed to use it up for something fast. I decided - what the heck - if it goes well with a sweet teriyaki glaze, it can go well with barbecue sauce. So I sliced up the green leafy sections of my bok choy and used it along with onion cut into half moons (I love onions so much that it's stupid). I sprang for a bag of Morning Star Chick n Strips, and voila! I found a vegan barbecue sauce and we were in business. Note: Be careful with Morning Star products. Not all of them are vegan. This particular product is, but many of the brand's other products contain eggs.

1:29 Project Barbecue Chicken Pizza

1 pre-made vegan Pizza Crust (or you can make your own)

1/2 of a large yellow onion, cut into half-moons

the leafy sections of 3 Bok Choy, cut into narrow strips (if you don't like greens or just don't care for bok choy, you can substitute any kind of green or omit it altogether)

1/3C Barbecue Sauce

2T vegan Butter

1/2 bag of vegan Chicken Strips, cut into a small dice

some Olive Oil for brushing the crust (optional)

Add a generous dollop of additional barbecue sauce to your chicken cubes and stir to coat. Heat the butter in a skillet or sautee pan over medium high heat. Toss the onions and bok choy greens until the onions are completely soft and see caramelization begin. The greens will wilt down considerably in this process. Remove the vegetables from heat. Spread the 1/3C of barbecue sauce evenly over the pizza crust. Distribute the chicken cubes. Add the vegetables on top. Brush the exposed crust with olive oil. Bake the pizza at 375 degrees for 25 minutes. Cut and serve.

I am sure your pizza was lovely by itself, but if ever you do want to have a cheese substitute on there and for whatever reason you don't want soy cheese, then try cashew nuts blended up with some water and dribbling it on the pizza before putting it in the oven.